


crash, crash

by thankstyler



Series: Dirk's Ocean [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Anxiety, Existential Crisis, Paradox, Short, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-26
Updated: 2017-11-26
Packaged: 2019-02-07 08:19:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12837069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thankstyler/pseuds/thankstyler
Summary: The waves go from calming to ominous in a matter of seconds, typically. Most of the time, you're dwindling in energy when they do; it's your cue to go to sleep.Tonight, you're on the roof, sitting in your pajamas in the rain.Thinking.





	crash, crash

The waves go from calming to ominous in a matter of seconds, typically. Most of the time, you're dwindling in energy when they do; it's your cue to go to sleep. 

Tonight, you're on the roof, sitting in your pajamas in the rain.

Thinking.

The endlessness of the horizon makes you upset, brows furrowed as fat drops of rain obscure your vision. The line between dark sky and sea blurs, turning everything into a mess of darkness and the steady crashing of waves against the supports on your apartment. There are times you worry that maybe, just maybe, they'll collapse. Some sort of tsunami or tropical storm will ruin your life. But for now, it's just the wide expanse of sea and night and stars, and it's making your stomach twist. Nobody in the world has seen this many stars at once, you'll bet on it. Thousands of twinkles reflecting off of the whooshing tides below. The ocean churns eternally, ticking like clockwork and moving like a dance. You find it somewhere in yourself to despise the ocean, the sea, any of it's counterparts. You recognize it's pointless. But for whatever reason, you hate it; it burns your throat like acid and makes your head reel.

The vastness of it all. How could you ever think you'd be able to find Roxy through all of this? There's so much water, rolling and utterly unforgiving. Not to mention the storms and drones you'd run into. You wouldn't even know where to look; Hal is only so strong of a machine to be able to churn out data on her location. You'd die at sea, hopeless. You'd leave her waiting for eons, and she would begin to think that you weren't even real.

You would let her down by trying, and you'd die, too.

"Brooding isn't really going to help you, is it?"

Hal's voice scares you, because it's yours. A perfect copy of monotone stoicism, ruining the blissful (albeit very unsettling) motion of waves and your own thoughts running around. You shrug, absent as ever, and he "tsh"s.

"You know the answer is overwhelmingly 'no', Dirk. There's nothing about this that's going to make your oh-so stressed psyche feel better right now. What you do need, as all humans do, is sleep. You worked all day, and if you get hypothermia from all the rain and wind tonight, we'll really be fucked over."

"Hi to you, too," you deadpan, suddenly feeling the chill he was mentioning. The numbness you've succumbed to over the years has been both a blessing and a curse. You lack all the human survival instincts, but you're definitely not half-bad at getting over yourself. Unless it's a time like this, where you either need to think or contemplate throwing yourself into those waves below. Crash, crash.

"Don't think about that," he says, matter-of-factly, like you can just stop in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, having a copy of yourself hanging around makes thinking independently difficult, and you know that when he fucks about with being able to think exactly the way you do, it's just to drive you crazy. "It's also not going to do much help."

"So what am I supposed to do, almighty overlord of understanding and knowledge? Obviously, I'm incrediously stupid for not fighting past my thoughts for once. Pardon the fact that the day I decided to investigate through my existential crisis it also chose to rain on me. Hypothermia isn't nearly as frightening as inevitable death and worthlessness if I never manage to escape this fucking apartment in the middle of Alien Ocean, USA. But no, excuse me, for worrying fucking endlessly about trying to find someone who I can't even be one hundred percent sure exists. Or is even still alive, plus two people who don't even live in the same time period as me. Oh, and, the fucking drones and other external factors like Batterbitch who all want me dead for one reason or another, but don't feel like trying hard enough to do anything more than scare the everloving shit out of me for a few days and make sure I know that I could die any day now. Fuck this ocean, fuck this life, and fuck you, Hal."

The waves crash against the beams, and you resign yourself to curling into your knees. It's reassuring even when you're shaking in the rain, even though the vastness of night consumes every part of you and you're so stressed out that you feel like a stretched rubber band.

Now, the sound is reassuring; it reminds you of humanity and how much cool shit happened back when your brother was alive. Reminds you how all those martyrs died, and maybe you'll be one of them, braving out the alien rule on Earth. It's inspiring, even though you know all of them had more courage than you ever will. Like it or not, you're not prepared to die. You don't think you're ever going to come to terms with the impending amount of _human_ you are.

"You sure do know how to make a guy speechless, Dirk. Have you ever stopped and pondered a second that maybe, just maybe, you're being a teensy bit dramatic?"

If Hal were a humanoid entity within reach, you would punch him straight in the face.

"Oh man, dude. I never stopped once to think about that. Holy shit, how could I have been so blind?" Everything is enunciated plainly, the same note. Your knuckles are white, gripping hard into the small bit of extra fabric on your jeans.

"You need to calm down."

"I don't fucking care," you mumble. Glass; you are glass, cracks cobwebbing out from the center where a bullet of anxiety has been firmly lodged into the center panel of your chest. "I can't," you reaffirm.

"Dirk, I need you to lie down if you want to feel better. Can you do that?"

You'd rather stay folded into a ball, trying to breathe and not being able to grab all of the air. Your lungs feel like they're filled with cotton and smoke and your eyes are burning. Tears spill out from them, but they feel like acid, and you gnaw at your left knee, rocking and tapping and hyperventilating.

You are helpless; lost at sea without paddles.

\--

When you wake up the following morning, you're being warmed by sunbeams trailing through the clouds and the echoing calls of seagulls. The waves continue to crash, the wind continues to blow. You stretch out sore limbs, wondering idly about the time or some other random, unimportant detail. 

"You're sunburned," Hal mentions offhandedly, and you rub the sleep from your eyes and dangle your legs off the edge of the roof.

"I'll put Aloe on it later."

The horizon is just as distant as it was yesterday. The sky still blurs to the movement of the sea, and the clouds still flow and the rain falls in the distance, even when it's sunny back here. You glance down to the same supports underneath your apartment, the same grey texture under your fingertips and the same sun, blazing the day across.

There's a tired sigh. You rise from the roof and descend into the darkness of your apartment, wondering when endless will decide to end and maybe, just maybe.

Vastness won't seem so much like an abyss of lonliness and anxiety.


End file.
